


[Art+Essay] Knight!Merlin and a "Political Analysis" of the Episode

by Purpleplums



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: "Political analysis", Art, Digital Art, Episode: s04e05 His Father's Son, Essay, Gen, It's not related to the essay though, Knight!Merlin, canon AU, theory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-10
Updated: 2018-10-10
Packaged: 2019-07-24 21:17:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,437
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16183361
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Purpleplums/pseuds/Purpleplums
Summary: A digital drawing of Merlin in a knight's armour and some analysis on this episode.





	[Art+Essay] Knight!Merlin and a "Political Analysis" of the Episode

**Author's Note:**

> The art and essay have no correlations and discussion is extremely welcome in the comments!

** Was Agravaine Right? **

 

His Father’s Son, notable for stuffing Merlin in a knight’s outfit (Which we all loved), showcasing once again Agravaine’s greasiness (god I hate that man) and Arthur’s self sacrificial needs which is the automatic trigger for Merlin’s self sacrificial needs. But I think the most interesting part is the main problem presented to us in this episode: Should you or should you not, kill a man in cold blood. Actually, let me rephrase the question, should you, as the sovereign of your country, execute a captured king for raiding your country numerous times thereby basically declaring war against your country? Yes, however much the episode wants us to identify with merlin’s POV (the show’s called Merlin for a reason) and however much we loath Agravaine, we simple can not ignore the politics and from a political point of view, Agravaine’s choice was probably the right one. Below are some deductions and observations which would back Agravaine’s choices:

  1. Arthur is a young and new King, yet to gain the full respect of other kingdoms’ sovereigns
  2. Caerleon has raided Camelot not once, but multiple times and is now at the heart of Camelot
  3. We can deduce some of King Caerleon’s characterizations by his actions: 
    1. Undiplomatic – Clearly shows contempt and disdain for Arthur (he is young, but he is still a king). You may argue that being in a life and death situation would probably make someone disagreeable, but, a diplomatic king would never attack another country like that (with no legitimate reason/attacking a past and possible future ally).
    2. Not exactly the brightest bulb – He is the king of a country for god’s sake and he runs around with a band of >50 men invading other countries?? In chess, you protect your king at all costs, you never let the king run around the board.
    3. Stubborn to a point of irrationality – You, as the king of a country, _need_ to be flexible. Land may be lost and reclaimed but your life can never be lost and reclaimed. Yes, a noble move, but also, extremely irrational. (Unless this was his plot was Queen Annis all along, making his sacrifice a reason to start a full-on invasion of Camelot (But really? The king’s life just for an entrance to a game they might not even win? This theory seems unlikely))
  4. Based on the above, we can safely say that this is a man who can not be reasoned with, someone where Arthur’s kindness would be wasted upon.
  5. He would definitely not have made a good ally, and so there’s no use in sparring his life to indebting Caerleon to Camelot.
  6. The other option would be to kill him which would keep Camelot safe, heighten Arthur’s popularity with people all over Camelot and establish Camelot’s sovereignty under Arthur’s rule



From the above I think we can see which the more tactically more advantageous choice is. Next, I’d like to talk about the consequence of this choice. This is where people probably start to argue the loudest that Merlin was right all along, and that this was all part of Agravaine’s plan to throw Camelot into war. Yes, it probably was Agravaine’s plan to throw Camelot into a war, but a war which Camelot would definitely win.

From the shot of Arthur looking down at queen Annis’s armies from a cliff we can safely say that Camelot’s armies have the geographical advantage. As Sun Zi (One of China’s most revered war tactician) has said, I paraphrase. “If you don’t have the timing of the heavens (A.K.A weather/fortune), the geographical advantages and the harmony of the people, you may be victorious, but the chances would be slight.” He lists them from least to most important. The timing of the heavens is unpredictable and favours randomly, but even so, as we see from the scene where Arthur battles Derian (The super tall half giant guy) that the wind blows towards Caerleon’s forces. Well, what does this mean? It means that if Camelot and Caerleon were indeed at war, that a simple rally of fire arrows at Caerleon’s forces would decimate them, with the wind spreading and strengthening the fire. Also, as we can clearly see, the geographical advantages for Camelot’s army is overwhelming. Caerleon’s army would have to climb a _cliff_ to just get to Camelot’s army. And if, if against all odds some of Caerleon’s troops were able to get through arrows and boulders and molten rocks/lead thrown down at them from on top of the cliffs, they would be tired, and unfit to fight. Camelot’s army could, potentially, destroyed them without a single casualty if they played their cards right. Now, we get to the most important piece, the harmony of the people, AKA morale. On one side, we have soldiers and knights protecting their land and family from invaders who are come for revenge for their king who has trespassed and raided Camelot numerous times while on the other side, we have soldiers fighting to claim revenge for their king, yes, but their king was someone who most of them have probably never even met before with questionable charisma. I think we can see who has higher morale here.

So, after all’s said and done, if Arthur followed Agravaine’s suggestions through and through would that have been the better choice than his bargain with the queen that could potentially cause Camelot to lose half of its land and her King? Was Merlin dead wrong about his suggestion to let the king go? But wait, there’s one last scene that I’d like to talk about.

When Arthur and Queen Annis talk after Arthur’s victory against Derian, we see her for the queen she is. Shrewd, cunning and diplomatic. I do not believe her to be a good person. No, but I believe her to be a true sovereign who is a natural diplomat. She came with a reason, a cause which was already more than the king had done. We can also see this when Arthur makes the deal with her, if she was able to crush Camelot would she have even listened? No! She knows she can’t win the battle so she’s playing “hard-to-get” to compel Arthur to make a deal so one-sidedly favours Caerleon. And of course, our Arthur, who’s too good and noble for politics makes just the deal that Caerleon wants, with no chance of winning, she gets a pretty big chance of killing the king of Camelot and half of Camelot without even losing a single soldier! And even if her champion was slain, well that would’ve been a lot better than a humiliating defeat wouldn’t it? A good diplomat must have a good judge of character and I believe queen Annis has exactly that. So, let’s look at our scenario again but this time Arthur _listens_ (*mind implodes*) to Merlin.

The King of Caerleon is captured on a raid of Camelot but instead of execution, the merciful king of Camelot, Arthur Pendragon escorts the king and his men back to Caerleon in good health and condition. Now, the queen sees her husband after finally getting caught for numerous attacks on another country would read between the lines that Camelot wants peace and alliance with Caerleon instead of war. Camelot, though her king young, is a prosperous country with some of the best knights in all of Albion. The queen decides that it would be best to return the favour of her husband spared by renewing Camelot and Caerleon’s alliance.

But wait, wasn’t this “essay” supposed to try to convince you that Agravaine’s idea was good and the tactically sound one? Well, turns out Merlin, probably unwittingly, would have done something extremely diplomatic. Without the loss of a single life his decision would have not only managed to stop Caerleon’s raids of Camelot but also renew their alliance taking them a step closer to the uniting of all of Albion. An alliance will always be better than no alliance. Especially in the case of Camelot and Caerleon since Camelot’s a landlocked country while Caerleon is right by the ocean. This would be economically and politically beneficial to Camelot.

In the end, I believe that even though Agravaine’s plan would’ve been the smart one, but Merlin’s choice would be the wise one. Merlin’s plan would’ve saved thousands, the king without making a deal that would possibly ruin Camelot. After all, the Art of War, written by Sun Zi is predominantly about war diplomacy and how to win wars without fighting wars and Merlin, our accidental genius, would’ve done just that.

 

 

 

Knight!Merin:


End file.
